Short Hops: No-no, a thousand times no

No-No, A Thousand Times “No”

While we can’t blame the Brewers and manager Ned Yost for sticking up for their guy, Yost’s snotty vilification of the Pirates official scorer in CC Sabathia’s near-no-hitter was over the top. Scorer Bob Webb was making these types of close calls 15 years before Yost became a major league manager. Ten scorers with at least a decade of experience were polled about the 45-foot roller that was bobbled by Sabathia; eight agreed with the ruling. Looking at the play, an objective case could be made either way — hardly incontrovertible grounds to do something as unprecedented as awarding a no-no retroactively. Fact is, the controversy would be a mirror image if the batter, Andy LaRoche, was amidst a 40-game hitting streak. Hah hah. That’s the irony. LaRoche was 21-for-131 (.160) in 2008, with one hit in his last 32 at-bats, at the time.

By Jorge, He’s Back

It is our contention that Jorge Velandia is actually part of the Witness Protection Program. The 33-year-old infielder was sold by the Indians to Tampa Bay over the weekend. He’s been there before. Since being signed out of Venezuela by the Tigers in 1992, he’s played in the organizations of the Padres, A’s, Mets (who released and re-signed him three times in less than two years), Braves, Pirates, White Sox, Rays, Pirates again and Blue Jays before hooking on with Cleveland in May.

The Rays haven’t brought him to the big club yet, but maybe they should since he’s wielding such a hot bat — in a manner of speaking. Velandia’s gotten nearly 6,000 at-bats in the minors, but never more than 60 in a major league season. He has, however, swatted .292 in his last 65 trips this year and last. Prior to that, he hadn’t sniffed The Show since 2003, at which point his .151 average stood as the fifth-lowest in modern history by a non-pitcher with 200 career plate appearances.

HIT AND RUN

Short Hops’ recurring installment of slapdash observation and imprudent opinion:

Gotta hand it to David Wright. He was still signing autographs outside Shea Stadium at 1:30 a.m. after the Mets’ excruciating, seven-run-lead-blowing loss to the Phillies on August 26.

There is almost zero chance that the Orioles will break their string of finishing no better than 20th in the majors in ERA every year since the millennium.

Victor Martinez, regarded in March by most fantasy-leaguers as the top offensive catcher in the game, just hit his first home run in 49 weeks. He’s been hurt, but his previous one was 207 at-bats ago.

Teams scored seven or more runs in a game 295 times between July 23 and September 2, but the A’s weren’t one of them. On Tuesday, their six-or-fewer streak reached 38.

QUOTABLES

“Cintron.” — Ozzie Guillen, asked after a loss who Baltimore’s player of the game was. (Alex Cintron was a late scratch with an illness, but his replacement Brian Roberts drove in three runs.)